


the way to a man’s 4-stroke, 2-cylinder, DOHC, liquid-cooled engine is through his heart

by spookykingdomstarlight



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Arguments as a Flirtatious Form of Art, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:47:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23136418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookykingdomstarlight/pseuds/spookykingdomstarlight
Summary: “Oh, I’m sure,” Ben answers, sour and unhappy. He’s not sure what’s worse: his mother inviting Poe into her life like this or Poe thinking Ben doesn’t also have dumb shit opinions about bikes. He’s the son of Han Solo. Of course he has dumb shit opinions about the coolest deathtraps money can buy.
Relationships: Poe Dameron/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13
Collections: The Kylo|Ben x Poe Fanworks Exchange 2020





	the way to a man’s 4-stroke, 2-cylinder, DOHC, liquid-cooled engine is through his heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reitoei](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reitoei/gifts).



All Ben Solo really wants is a good night’s sleep. Some days, he’s sure that’s the only thing he ever really wanted all along, and this is one of them. Well, it would be one of them if it was still daylight. Now it’s well past two in the morning and Ben Solo is wide awake, fuming over nothing, and… thirsty.

This is his house. He’s allowed to be thirsty if he wants to be. He could rampage around the entire downstairs for all that it matters because he lives here. It’s where all his stuff is. He could tell you when every mark on his desk, the wall, his ancient bed frame was put there—sophomore year of high school—and why he did it—because he’s an asshole. The point is that he shouldn’t feel like a stranger in his own goddamned home.

And yet.

The pillow is weird and the mattress is too supportive and every creak of the foundation cracks loud as thunder in his ears. He’s been away too long, he thinks, and wonders if he shouldn’t have found a way to stay gone longer.

Clamoring out of bed, huffing in disgust at himself and the entire world around him, he wanders barefoot into the kitchen and mentally congratulates himself for not tripping over the unfamiliar artifacts that dot the living room, new potted plants and rearranged furniture and a cat that doesn’t even belong to his mother, a little white and orange monstrosity that finds every excuse to wind around Ben’s ankles and chirp playfully when Ben has to dance away awkwardly to avoid stepping on him.

It’s fine. It’s really all perfectly fine—everything is okay—until he hears a voice calling out in the dark, belonging to a curly-haired shadow leaning against the island in the center of the kitchen.

“Hey.”

“Jesus—fuck. Holy _shit_ ,” Ben says, with feeling, because his heart is going to punch its way out of his chest. “What the fuck?” His rational mind catches up to him at about the same time his ability to breathe returns. “Why in the hell are you still here?”

When he was going to bed—at eleven, like a normal person—his mother and Poe fucking Dameron were still in the living room, acting for all the world like they were discussing how to solve world peace instead of what they were actually doing, which was arguing over the relative merits of Kawasaki versus KTM streetbikes over glasses of whisky. He’d expected—also like a normal person—to discover in the morning that Poe Dameron had at some point finally gone home and Ben Solo could relax again and pretend like his mother hadn’t found an exquisitely handsome, passably charming surrogate son in his absence.

Poe Dameron, still half lounging across the marble despite Ben’s sudden arrival, a mug of something cupped between his palms, is not wearing the same thing he was wearing earlier—Ben Solo will never admit to knowing that, by the way, not even on pain of death—and has a devastatingly self-deprecating smile on his mouth.

“It’s not what it looks like,” Poe Dameron replies, dry as dust.

“It looks like you drank too much and stayed up late and my mother insisted that you stay because god forbid you call an Uber to take you home.”

“Yeah.” Poe Dameron’s stupid hand brushes through his stupid head of hair. “I did try. Maybe we got a bit carried away.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” Ben answers, sour and unhappy. He’s not sure what’s worse: his mother inviting Poe into her life like this or Poe thinking Ben doesn’t also have dumb shit opinions about bikes. He’s the son of Han Solo. Of course he has dumb shit opinions about the coolest deathtraps money can buy. It’s just that his opinions are right and theirs are spectacularly, tragically wrong. “Kawasakis are garbage, by the way. What you really want is a Triumph, but you’re probably not ready to hear that truth.”

Poe’s mouth falls open and his eyes widen, catching the glint of moonlight through the half-open blinds. Then, a blinding, brilliant, beautiful smile crosses his mouth and he’s laughing and Ben feels stupidly as though he’s won the lottery. Hopefully it doesn’t turn out to be a Shirley Jackson-esque win, but that remains to be seen. Talking to Poe is a bit like getting hit in the face with a brick after all. At least Ben always comes out of it feeling a little dazed. “Oh, buddy. Them’s some big fighting words. I hope _you’re_ ready.”

Ben is viciously pleased to have all of Poe’s attention directed his way regardless. It’s the first time in the seven days Ben’s been back that he’s had it all to himself. Poe’s only been by four of those seven evenings, but most of the chatter revolves around the work he and Ben’s mother are doing, their enthusiasm shining through each word spoken at lightning speed. Since Ben’s in another discipline entirely—paleography to their polisci—he is rather useless in those conversations and knows it. Before now, whenever conversational drift occurred, it remained between them while Ben fucked off to study or stew as they got lost in their own orbit.

Now that Poe is looking at him like this, though, he’s beginning to hope that might change.

Stupid. It’s so stupid. Poe’s just a guy, handsome and smart when he stops pretending to be dumb, and Ben’s never been swayed by _just a guy_ sorts before. Why should he hope for anything from him? Poe’s a brat, not unlike Ben, and it’s a bad idea to want things from his mother’s… whatever Poe is. It would be better to cut this line of thinking off right the fuck now.

“I’m not sure there’s anything I need to be ready for here,” Ben answered in challenge. Because he was his father’s son and his mother’s son, too, and he never stood a chance of doing the right thing romantically when he could walk with eyes wide open into a spectacular garbage fire. Sometimes, like his mother and father, it works out okay.

And, oh, Poe picks up the challenge beautifully, daring and bold, tipping his chin up and smirking. Ben’s wishing he turned on a light so he could see it in its full glory. “How about this?” he asks. “I’ll take you out to dinner and you can tell me in exquisite detail how much of an idiot I am. Sound good?”

Ben is no longer thirsty, but he still finds himself pulling a mug from the cupboard to brew a cup of tea, an excuse to stand next to Poe at the counter for a while. He smirks a little at Poe as he waits the four minutes until his tea is done, letting Poe dangle, waiting for an answer. It does sound good, better than, and he’s not entirely above admitting it.

“Sure. Sounds okay,” he says.

Okay, maybe he’s still slightly above admitting it, but Poe just laughs and nudges his arm, head tilted to get a better look at Ben’s face in the scant light, and he thinks Poe gets it.

He thinks maybe it won’t be so bad having him around.


End file.
